Gizmodo: Israeli

Israeli Military Guardian Vehicle is Like the Batmobile Without Batman Driving

Jason Chen — Wed, 30 Apr 2008 17:00:00 EDT

Other than taking obvious influences from the Tumbler from Batman Begins, this Israeli Guardium unmanned patrol shares more in common with the iRobot PackBot than Batman's roof-hopping car. The Guardium can either be self-controlled or steered by an operator miles away, and is loaded with cameras, night-vision sensors and machine guns. Unlike the PackBot, which demands that a human be in the loop at all times, the Guardium can be autonomous if the need arises. Let's just hope its programming is really, really good and it doesn't go off killing because it thought it saw a ghost. [Fox News via NewLaunches]

Israeli Military Wants to Build Artificially Intelligent Missile Defense System, a.k.a. Skynet

Jason Chen — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 15:31:11 EST

If news of the Israeli military developing a robotic defense system that's completely AI and human-independent doesn't scare you, you haven't watched as many Terminator movies as we have. Their system, which defends against attacks that would "exceed physiological limits of human command," is described thusly.

...supremely oriented, highly intuitive virtual coach-cum-battle manager whose primary mission would support system operators and commanders during engagements. As such, the super system would help Israeli air defenders pick the optimum timing, sequence and targets for specific interceptors.

The good news, which luckily we read right before crapping ourselves for the third time today, is that the developers aren't focusing entirely on making it autonomous, but a sort of hybrid.

"Our approach cannot be based exclusively on man-in-the-loop, nor can it rely only on the opposite. Rather, we need to build an operational concept and a system that is flexible and situationally dependent," Milo said.
In the future, and "under very complex scenarios," Milo said, the envisioned super system would be able to generate a level of supreme situational awareness and snap intuitive capabilities that could surpass the very best wartime commanders.

Nevertheless, if we're all killed by an AI system in 20 years, you know who to blame. [Wired]

Live in Israel, Get Free Cell Service

Travis Hudson — Fri, 24 Mar 2006 16:08:12 EST

Israeli Orange customers who happen to be using 3G phones will be able to rid themselves of pesky bills by simply watching a few commercials. The program will either offer partial discounts or a complete discount of the monthly bill depending on how many ads are actually watched. Possibly bombarded with ads for free or cheap cell service? Yay or nay, what do you think?

Pay your cell-phone bill by watching ads [picturephoning]